Month: May 2011

Design is so refreshing when it reveals its clever side and makes us think; and that’s just what artist/freelance designer Tang Yau Hoong’s illustrations do. By a creative use of negative space and a persistent re-imagining of objects, his work is entertaining as it is smart. Besides occasionally producing prints of his work Hoong has many snappy t-shirt versions of his designs printed through Threadless.

Two flat years of advertising sales has been the key factor behind New York City Transit stepping up its efforts to sell advertising in the subway. Ads have been inside the trains and stations but for only the second time ever a full-length ten-car subway train will be completely covered in advertising.

Between the years of 1945 and 1998, 2,053 nuclear explosions occurred in the United States, USSR/Russia, France, the United Kingdom, China, India, and Pakistan (North Korea was excluded). One of the most interesting accounts this visualization depicts are both the atmospheric and underground nuclear explosions that occurred on land and sea; and the destruction ultimately left in their wake.…

With the use of sensors and hand-held electronics, the real-time city is now a reality. Carlo Ratti is a civil engineer and architect who teaches at MIT in Cambridge, MA where he directs the SENSEable City Laboratory. There, his team studies the data we create — phone calls made, garage thrown away — to generate stunning visualizations of city life.…

In times of great turmoil musicians find inspiration in the moment and attempt to capture the state of political unrest and put the revolution to music and art. In Libya, there’s no exception. MC Swat, 23, is a lyricist who’s been writing blistering lyrics against the Gaddafi regime since the uprising began in February.…

Star Wars and Disney characters collide for a bizarre mash-up of galactic goofiness. In the past Disney has made Star War action figures out of their characters. Nathan H. Boyd created his own versions here:…

With the hope of spurring more world news interest in the U.S., artist Johnny Selman decided to communicate his message using a more “visually interesting vehicle.” His ambitious project sees him creating a new poster each day for an entire year, each based upon the headlines from the front page of the BBC News website. Considering the tight schedule on which he works, Selmans posters are incredibly well done and clever. See his continuing daily works at bbcx365.com

Kamel Makhloufi created this simple yet stunning visualization of Iraq war casualties using just pixels to represent deaths. Looking like the defragmentation of a hard-drive, the image is split between a representation of casualties by volume (left) and one showing casualties over time (right). Casualty types are broken down into four different colors: blue represents “friendly,” green denotes “hosts,” orange “civilians” and grey “enemies.” Based upon data released by Wikileaks as reported by the Guardian, the sobering reproduction of the data speaks volumes and patterns begin to reveal themselves.…

Have you ever thought of using plastic wrap and packing tape to make street art, and then using the pedestrians passing by as actors in your grand plan? This is what Mark Jenkins does regularly for his street installations. His shocking installations are cast wrapping an object in plastic wrap followed by clear packing tape. After 2006, Mark started to dress his self casts to create hyper realistic sculptures in his Embed series.

Everyone has seen breakdancers on the streets, but not everyone has seen them like this. While breakdancing is often viewed as a street culture, its roots go much deeper than a group of young people doing acrobatics on the street. Carlo Cruz, while not a dancer himself, became inspired when his cousin made a b-boy documentary and asked him to take some stills. From then on he was hooked and his photography continues to transform the street culture into an art form.